Also: Could Coding Be The Next Mass Profession?

Will the next generations learn that software development is the next big opportunity and has been for years?

There is a new opportunity emerging for young people to do productive, entrepreneurial, satisfying work: they can learn to code. Code isn't that hard to start to learn – one outsourcing firm takes people with no training and makes them full-time Java programmers in 3 months. (Of course, mastery takes tremendous talent and craft.) Coding isn't expensive – with netbooks, cloud hosting and storage, and open source software. Beyond a certain point, coders are self-taught, and can continue to advance their skills.

They're handing out Gutenberg printing presses out there: with services like Treehouse (I'm a dues-paying member) and Codecademy (and its expertly-timed year of code), countless university courses free online, Google Code University, the warm embrace of Stack Overflow, in-person courses like Dev Bootcamp, summer camps for kids, even the promise of a one-day result with Decoded (the six-minute abs of learning to code), and great organizations like CodeNow (which I've been supporting) reaching out to teach code in underserved communities. I'm sure I've left many out.